The Style Maven: an outbreak of spots

I've been seeing spots for the past few days. Ever since I decided to write about them they have appeared before my eyes - big black ones on a breezy white chiffon shirt worn by one of our interns; little polka dots embedded in a velvet pencil skirt on a femme fatale-ish train passenger; jaunty white ones on a red scarf tied around the collar of a dapper old man at the bus stop. Spots, it seems, are integral to all of our wardrobes, always natty but, depending on size and colour, as loud or as discreet as we want them to be.

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A spot can be fun in a jolly, eccentric way, as Moschino, Paul Smith and Boden have all known for some time. Then there is the bold, cultish, pleasingly poncey spot, the Comme des Garçons spot, much loved by graphic designers and architects, the understated status symbol of the thinking fashion follower. (To this day I remain annoyed that I never managed to get hold of one of those 2008 Comme des Garçons for H&M spotted cardigans. To this day.)

But this month spots have moved into the world of luxury. The renowned Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama, who had a retrospective at Tate Modern earlier this year and whose work is as spotty as it gets (she describes her life as 'a dot lost among millions of other dots'), has created a limited-edition collection for Louis Vuitton. Scarves, trousers, handbags have all been smothered in her spot treatment and in August the windows of Selfridges in London will be spotty for six whole weeks. It's fashion chickenpox!

These premium dots, coming in at a premium price, naturally, are set to become collectors' items and I'm sure I'll be eyeing them covetously for years to come on those who made the investment. But spots are too democratic to be reserved for an elite. And that's why Marc Jacobs is a genius businessman as well as a visionary designer. For, funnily enough, the creative director of Louis Vuitton has chosen this month to launch his own new fragrance called… Dot. With shower gel starting at £26, Jacobs is ensuring both the bottom and top of the market is smothered in small round dots. I expect they will prove highly contagious.